Object Access

Object Access

A Library exposes top-level configuration entries as read-only nested objects through PHP's magic property access. It is a convenience for reading deep config without dotted strings.

Object access is a feature of Library only. The Classes base does not provide it, and the Config facade is static — there is no instance to read properties from.

Reading a subtree as an object

use InitPHP\Config\Library;

$config = new Library();
$config->set('db.host', 'localhost')
       ->set('db.user', 'root');

$db = $config->db;       // stdClass

$db->host;               // 'localhost'
$db->user;               // 'root'

Nesting works to any depth:

$config->set('services.cache.driver', 'redis');

$config->services->cache->driver; // 'redis'

Scalars and missing keys

• A scalar top-level entry is returned as-is.
• An unknown key returns null.

$config->set('name', 'InitPHP');

$config->name;    // 'InitPHP'  (scalar, returned directly)
$config->unknown; // null

How it works

Library::__get($name) looks the key up in the underlying store. If the value is an array it is converted, recursively, into a nested stdClass; scalars pass through unchanged; an absent key yields null.

// Equivalent ways to read the same value:
$config->get('db.host'); // via the dotted-path API
$config->db->host;       // via object access

Casing

Because the store is case-insensitive, the object's property names are the lower-cased form of the keys:

$config->set('DB.Host', 'localhost');

$config->db->host; // 'localhost'
// $config->DB->Host would not match — keys are normalised to lower-case.

It is a snapshot, not a live view

__get builds a fresh object from the current data each time it is called. Mutating the returned object does not write back into the configuration:

$config->set('db.host', 'localhost');

$db = $config->db;
$db->host = 'changed';        // touches the local copy only

$config->get('db.host');      // 'localhost'  (unchanged)

To change configuration, use set().

Related reading

• The Library Object — the full object API.
• Keys & Dotted Paths — the dotted-string equivalent.